Death Can’t Take a Joke (11 page)

When he called Marika’s place, it was her sister Basia who picked up the phone.

‘
Czesc
, Basia. Listen, something’s come up which means I won’t be able to go to the masons with Marika this afternoon.’

‘Oh, that’s a shame,’ she said. ‘I know Marika was looking forward to seeing you.’

He felt a bolt of white-hot guilt in his guts.

‘Is she around?’ he asked. ‘Maybe we can rearrange it for tomorrow.’

‘She is sleeping now, I don’t like to wake her,’ said Basia. ‘Shall I give her a message later?’

Janusz hesitated: he didn’t want her to think he was cancelling for no good reason.

‘Yes. Tell her it means the world to me, helping her to choose Jim’s memorial stone …’ his throat closed up and he had to get a grip on himself before continuing. ‘But there’s something I need to do that can’t be put off. It might even help me find Jim’s killers.’

There was a shocked silence at the other end of the line. ‘Really? You have found some evidence?’

‘I really can’t say,’ he said. ‘Just tell her that, will you?’

He heard Basia take a shaky breath. ‘
Tak.
’ It was clear that she, too, was struggling with Jim’s death.

Deciding what he should wear to fit the part he had to play at tonight’s party was easier to fix: he phoned Kasia. She was glad of the chance to make up for standing him up the other night, and made him write down the outfit while he was still on the phone. Black jeans, a black crewneck cashmere sweater she’d bought for his birthday, and a black textured wool jacket she approved of that he’d had for years. After hanging up, he drew a sigh of relief: at least she didn’t say he had to wear a suit.

The drinks party was taking place a stone’s throw from Romescu’s apartment, in another of the Millharbour high-rises. At reception, a beautiful black girl checked his name against the invite list and gave him a security pass that operated a private lift going to the 48th floor. The lift ascended at what he sensed was an incredible speed, although it made only the faintest of hums, stopping when it reached the highest level.

When the lift doors opened, a smartly dressed young guy with an Eastern European accent – who presumably worked for the Romanian – greeted him by name, which for tonight was Lukas Rozak. Janusz was ushered into a swanky bar area, where a crowd of thirty or forty men, mostly middle-aged, chatted in small groups.

Passing one such cluster, he saw at its heart a gorgeous girl wearing a revealing deep-pink evening gown. Her smile seemed genuine enough but when her gaze flickered across him he recognised the glazed look of a working girl. In their drab-coloured suits, the men resembled a swarm of locusts mobbing a flowering cherry.

Glancing around, Janusz saw that every group had been assigned its own hot girl, every one of them beautifully dressed and most of them toting the kind of breasts that kept silicon manufacturers in business.

At the heart of the throng, a close-cropped bullet head above a wide muscular back came into view.

‘Mr Romescu?’ said the flunky. ‘May I introduce Mr Lukas Rozak?’

Romescu turned to shake Janusz’s hand. ‘A very great pleasure to meet you, Lukas – if I can call you that?’ Without pausing to hear Janusz’s reply, he went on: ‘And of course you must call me Barbu.’ He clapped Janusz on the shoulder – a gesture that, although appearing friendly enough, managed to telegraph who was in charge of this encounter. ‘So you are the famous friend of Marek, yes?’

‘A friend of a friend, actually.’ Janusz smiled back, resisting the impulse to shake off Romescu’s hand. ‘But I have heard Marek is very impressed with the returns you’re making for him.’

Romescu sketched a modest wave. ‘There are lots of excellent business opportunities in the East, if you know where to find them.’ He cocked his head on one side. ‘I am guessing, Lukas, that you were brought up in Poland?’

‘Yes, in Gdansk. I came here in the eighties.’

‘In Romania we envied you Poles and your freedom to travel. Our “Little Father” liked to keep his people close.’ A spasm of hatred twisted Romescu’s face as he named Romania’s Communist despot, Nikolai Ceausescu. ‘I managed to get out, but I wouldn’t have risked it if I’d had any family still alive.’

‘There would have been reprisals?’

The Romanian nodded. ‘My country is famous for two of its heads of state. But at least Vlad the Impaler didn’t delude himself that he had the people’s interests at heart.’

The exchange appeared to have exhausted Romescu’s supply of emotion, for the folds of his face settled back into what Janusz deduced to be its usual cold expression. Only his eyes, which were a fierce yet chilly blue, seemed alive: they seemed never to rest, darting over Janusz’s face, or over his shoulder – seeking out the next, potentially more profitable, encounter.

‘Let’s get you a drink,’ he said, waving over one of the waiters doing the rounds of the crowd. Janusz asked for tonic water – he’d have killed for a beer but he couldn’t risk it. If he should slip up and Romescu smelt a rat, he had a feeling it could seriously damage his health. He noticed that the Romanian ordered a soft drink, too, and remembered the unappetising contents of his fridge. The guy was a few years older than Janusz, late forties, maybe fifty, but the wide shoulders spoke of a regular workout regime and there was no hint of paunch under the soft material of his shirt.

‘It’s hard work staying in shape, when you get past forty,’ sighed Janusz patting his stomach. ‘I barely drink alcohol any more’ – a vision of his beer and
bigos
lunch flashed before him – ‘and I’ve given up red meat and processed carbs altogether. But it’s a price I’m happy to pay, if it keeps me alive till I’m a hundred.’

‘I am glad to hear you say it,’ said Romescu, his rapacious gaze taking an inventory of Janusz’s face. ‘People don’t understand that the body is a gift, something to be cherished and nurtured. And it can be snatched away from you –’ he snapped his fingers, ‘– like that.’

Sensing he’d chanced upon some deeply held belief, Janusz let his gaze linger on the strange scar down the side of the older man’s face, which he’d so far avoided looking at. ‘Please tell me if it’s none of my business, Barbu,’ he said. ‘But perhaps you speak from personal experience?’

Romescu gazed at him for a long moment, making Janusz wonder if he’d gone too far. Then he returned his hand to his shoulder. ‘It’s a long story, Lukas, and right now I’ve got to do my little speech
,
but maybe I’ll bore you with it later on.’

As Romescu made his way to a raised area beside the bar, Janusz slipped to the very back of the crowd. The underling who had shown him in chimed softly on a glass with a spoon. ‘The founder and chief executive of Triangle Investments, Barbu Romescu, asks his guests for a few moments of their time.’

‘Gentlemen, ladies,’ he began, his intent gaze raking the faces before him. ‘I’m not a fan of long speeches, but I want to thank you all for coming this evening and to say just a few words about Triangle. Some of you became investors when I started the company six months ago, and I hope you approve of the returns we have delivered so far.’ There was an approving murmur from parts of the crowd and one guy, clearly already well-oiled, raised his glass and cried
‘Na zdrowie!’
,
causing a ripple of laughter.

‘What a coincidence, seeing you here.’ A low-pitched voice speaking Polish in Janusz’s ear sent a tingle up his neck.
Varenka.

He turned and looked into her eyes, which held a look of satirical enquiry.

‘Hello,’ he said. ‘I was rather hoping I’d run into you.’ It was true, he realised, even if, having seen his real name on his business card, there was a risk she might betray him to Romescu.

She arched an eyebrow. ‘Really? I thought you were here to make a million euros.’

Her dark blonde hair was captured in a loose knot to one side of her head tonight, Janusz noticed. ‘Well, a million euros is always nice.’ He tipped his head, never taking his eyes off hers. ‘Although, man cannot live by bread alone.’

‘… but by every word that issues from the mouth of God?’ she said, completing the quotation.

Janusz noted her amused yet deadpan expression. Was she saying she might be a whore, but she still knew her Bible?

Falling silent, they turned to watch Romescu speak.

‘… from Poland all the way to the Balkans, we’re getting in at the ground floor, buying into the rapid growth of the post-Soviet economies with an investment portfolio that includes commercial property, leisure and fitness, agriculture …’

Yeah … and trading women like livestock,
thought Janusz
.

He studied Varenka out of the corner of his eye. She stood with one hand to her throat, above a small, neat bust. Her expression was ambiguous, seeming to combine the vigilance of a caged wild animal watching its captor, with a sort of wary tolerance – affection, even. In profile, a tiny kink was visible just below the bridge of her nose – the result of a childhood accident? Or a blow from Romescu’s fist? Whatever the cause, it added character to her otherwise flawless face.

‘Do you think you will you invest?’ she asked, under her breath.

‘Would you advise me to?’

She held her bottom lip between her teeth momentarily, appearing to give it serious thought. ‘Yes. Why not? Barbu always makes money, whatever business he goes into.’

‘And what about you? Do you play a role in his business?’

‘I would like to say that was true.’ In her look he glimpsed the ghost of that youthful optimism which had shone out of her driving licence mugshot. ‘I studied economics in night school at Kiev University – for a while.’

‘I’m impressed. Why did you give it up?’

‘Maybe I couldn’t decide whether I was a Friedmanite or a Keynesian,’ she joked. Holding her long hands out in front of her, she studied them dispassionately for a moment before going on. ‘Truthfully? I could never really afford it. There were no government grants for students and I had … family responsibilities. I had to work.’

Janusz was too much of a gentleman to press her on the form that work took.

‘And you?’ she asked. ‘No doubt you went to university?’

‘Yes, in Krakow.’

‘Jagiellonski?’ Her eyes widened.

He nodded. ‘I read physics and chemistry. But I dropped out without finishing my degree.’ He lifted one shoulder. ‘It was the eighties, and I decided my duty lay out on the streets with my fellow Poles fighting the Commies
.
’ His tone was self-deprecating, half-mocking the idealism of youth.

‘You were a fool!’ The vehemence of her words took him aback, but the next moment she touched his forearm in a gesture of apology. ‘Please excuse my bad manners. But to throw away such an opportunity, to me that is like … squandering water in the desert.’

Janusz hesitated, feeling the urge to fight his corner, to explain to her how his country’s fight for freedom had come above all else – before deciding against it. She was too young truly to understand how communism had blighted lives, extinguished hope. Anyway, he was here to investigate Romescu’s activities, not to debate political philosophy with a twenty-six-year-old.

‘Would you like the opportunity to become more involved in Barbu’s business?’ he asked, playing the innocent, trying to get a handle on their relationship.

She sent him a look of mild reproach. ‘I don’t think that’s very likely. I am here as his “plus one”, and to improve the scenery for his guests – not for my proficiency in economics.’ This was said in her usual tone of dry amusement and without apparent resentment. ‘So far, I’ve spoken to two dentists, two Polish supermarket magnates, and a man who believes in UFOs. What about you? What do you do?’

‘Oh, nothing exciting. Import and export, mostly,’ he said. ‘I’m here because I have money to invest from the sale of my mother’s estate in Krakow and those sharks at the bank are only paying a couple of per cent.’

She turned to him, eyebrows arched in distress. ‘I’m so sorry! Has your mama passed?’

‘Yes, but it was a long time ago.’

‘It doesn’t matter how long ago,’ Varenka’s husky voice became passionate. ‘Losing someone you love, it stays with you, here’ – she pressed a fist to her breastbone – ‘forever.’

The look on her face spoke of an inconsolable grief.
Had she been carer to a parent who’d become sick and later died?
Janusz wondered. Was that why she’d had to give up her studies? Or perhaps it was the older brother from the seaside photo who had died young? Whoever she had lost, it was apparent that she had never got over it. Sensing that he’d begun to win her confidence, Janusz was calculating how to press home his advantage when he heard the sound of clapping. Romescu had finished his speech.

Spreading his arms to acknowledge the applause, his searchlight gaze swept the room.

Janusz sensed Varenka freeze beside him and without turning her head she murmured, ‘I have to go.’ Before he could even reply, her half-naked back was gliding away from him through the crowd. Had Romescu registered the two of them? If so, he’d given no sign of it.

It was an hour or more before Romescu came looking for Janusz. He was outside, leaning on the parapet of the viewing deck, nursing his third tonic water of the evening and trying to pretend it was a cold Tyskie.

‘Are you having a good evening, Lukas?’ asked the Romanian.

‘Most enjoyable,’ said Janusz. ‘And that’s quite a view.’

They looked out over the rectilinear expanse of the old Millwall Dock far below, a once-mighty hub of world commerce trading timber and grain, its black waters empty now, reflecting the constellation of lights in the office and apartment blocks fringing its shores. Beyond it, the loop of Thames that curled around the Millennium Dome flowed steadily east, silver blue in the deepening winter dusk.

‘I have an apartment not far from here,’ said Romescu, pointing out the finger of glass where Janusz had done a little breaking and entering only yesterday.

He whistled appreciatively. ‘Nice location. Did you buy it recently?’

‘Two or three years back. Cost me a couple of million.’

Janusz always liked the bracing honesty with which immigrants talked about money: had Romescu been an Englishman he’d still have managed to get across what he paid for his place, but the information would have been conveyed with heavy hints and hedged about with false modesty.